The present invention relates to data storage, and more specifically, this invention relates to selecting a data storage location to achieve improved space allocation.
When selecting a volume with which to perform a data set allocation, previous implementations have selected the volume having the most available free space. However, by continually performing data set allocations at the volume that has the most available free space, this has led to allocation failures resulting from the control data structure being filled to capacity while free space still exists in the volume. If the control data structure is full, no additional data sets can be allocated on the volumes associated therewith, thereby reducing data storage efficiency. Moreover, in some cases, existing data sets cannot extend on those same volumes. In turn, this additionally results in extra overhead during the allocation process, because the volumes having filled control data structures are examined during subsequent allocation requests despite being unavailable.